Save Our Raptors, Don’t Use Rodenticide!

If you love birds, then please don’t use rodenticide to kill rodents in and around your home.

Rodenticide kills more than rodents.

It kills the birds that prey on the rodents eating the poison, such as owls, hawks, eagles, falcons, and even turkey vultures.

In short, nearly every species of raptor is dying of rodenticide poisoning.

One breed especially vulnerable is the Barn Owl because it eats so many mice.

Yes, Harry Potter fans, even owls that look like Hedwig die from rodenticide poisoning.

And it also kills other mammals that prey on rodents, such as red foxes, gray foxes, coyotes, wolves, raccoons, black bears, skunks, badgers, mountain lions, bobcats, and even your family pets – cats and dogs.

And finally, worst of all, children.

No living creature is safe.

We hope we have your attention now.

Toxic Food Web

Raptors are the Solutions (RATS) is a non-profit group educating people about the ecological role of birds of prey in urban and wild areas, and the dangers they face from widespread use of rat poisons.

They created this graphic showing how birds of prey become poisoned with rodenticide.

Here’s how we are poisoning birds of prey.

You (or your exterminator) place a bait box containing rodenticide around your home.

The bait is eaten by voles, mice, and rats, or it leaches into the groundwater and fish, earthworms, snails, slugs and salamanders come into contact with the rodenticide.

Songbirds, shrews, moles, and skunks eat those living things that come in contact with rodenticide, and they become prey for raptors such as Red-tailed Hawks, Cooper’s Hawk, owls, and Bald Eagles.

Our family pets also get entangled in this vicious food web.

And systematically, one by one, the toxic food web starts from the smallest organism and makes its way up the food chain reaching birds of prey.

Growing Concern

Rodenticide poisoning is a growing concern among raptors.

In California’s San Diego County, rodenticides showed up in 92 percent of raptors.

In New York, rodenticides were found in 49 percent of 12 species of necropsied raptors. For Great Horned Owls, the figure was 81 percent.

A study by Tufts University found that 88 percent of raptors have rodenticide poisoning.

It inhibits the bird’s coagulation factor, they cannot clot their blood and then bleed out.

According to Christine Peyreigne, who runs Christine’s Critters Inc., a Wildlife Rehabilitation and Education non-profit in Weston, Connecticut, “Administering vitamin-K immediately for rodenticide poisoning gives a bird of prey a greater chance of recovery.”

“There’s no such thing as a hawk transfusion, and by the time the bird shows symptoms and someone brings it in for care, it’s often already too late.”

Read more about how poisons used to kill rodents pose fatal threat to birds of prey and other wildlife at https://intobirds.com/save-our...